New HIV reservoir discovered
"These results are paradigm changing because they demonstrate that cells other than T cells can serve as a reservoir for HIV," said Jenna Honeycutt, Ph.D., lead-author and postdoctoral research associate in the UNC Division of Infectious Diseases. "The fact that HIV-infected macrophages can persist means that any possible therapeutic intervention to eradicate HIV might have to target two very different types of cells." Last spring, this laboratory lead by J. Victor Garcia, Ph. D., professor of medicine, microbiology and immunology at UNC School of Medicine, demonstrated the ability of tissue macrophages to support HIV replication in vivo in the total absence of human T cells. But how macrophages would respond to antiretroviral therapy (ART) and whether macrophages represented a reservoir for HIV after treatment were unknown. Macrophages are myeloid lineage cells that have been implicated in HIV pathogenesis and in the trafficking of virus into the brain. Usin...